


Sunset

by Gallicenae



Series: Misc Fic Gifts [1]
Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age II
Genre: ALL THE ANGST, Gen, The Deep Roads, The Taint
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-08
Updated: 2015-08-08
Packaged: 2018-04-13 17:07:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 760
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4530186
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Gallicenae/pseuds/Gallicenae
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>DA Ficswap for BrennaCeDria's AU Ria Hawke. Death in the Deep Roads.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Sunset

**Author's Note:**

  * For [BrennaCeDria](https://archiveofourown.org/users/BrennaCeDria/gifts).



Varric cradled Bianca in his arms, a satisfied grin rubbed across his stubbled face. “I’ll just call that bunch ‘enemies’ and footnote it later.”

“I hope you add something about their wretched faces,” Isabela toed a darkspawn corpse, “Or at least the stench.”

“Hmm.” Varric strapped Bianca to his back as the group moved deeper into the dark tunnels. “With breath that could rot the skin off your bones.” 

Ria chimed in, “And a face not even a mother could love” She tossed a pilfered coin over her shoulder to Varric. “Well, maybe yours would.”

“If you’re talking about Bartrand, I can assure you, our mother always complained about his nose being just a little too crooked.”

Laughing, Ria caught up with Bethany, hooking her arm through her younger sister’s. “You’ve been awfully quiet while we’ve been down here.” She leaned forward to catch a look at Beth’s face.

Bethany’s attention was elsewhere, notably on the ground before her feet. Ria noticed the cadence of her sister’s breathing was off, not so much ragged as it was slight. Her warm, olive skin looked cold, but that could have been the eerie light of the caverns. Ria squeezed Beth’s arm. “Hey. Are you alright?”

“Y-yes. It’s nothing.” Bethany tapped Ria’s hand and gave her best smile, though the corners of her mouth betrayed how she felt.

Ria pulled them to a stop. “What is it?”

“I don’t want to be a bother.”

“You, a bother? Sweetness, that is on my very short list of impossible things.” Isabela put a gentle hand on top of Beth’s head and smiled, hoping to encourage the younger Hawke to say what was on her mind.

“It’s just, this place.” She tried to shrug off her feelings. “I guess I’m starting to understand why you’re not a fan, Varric.”

“I tell you what kiddo, when we make it through this, you can stay with me if Freckles here ever wants to go back underground.”

Bethany nodded in agreement before turning her attention to her big sister. “Let’s go. The sooner we’re done here, the sooner we can go home to Mother.”

\---

“Ugh, I think I got spirit juice on me.” Ria brushed the remnants of the rock wraith off her shoulders. They’d fought through waves of darkspawn, a bloody dragon, and countless wraiths to get here, and Ria wondered if they were even marginally close to escaping the Deep Roads.

Isabela was thigh deep in piles of loot, digging around for the best pieces. Varric kept his mind on searching for more useful items, looking for anything that could get them through that giant-ass door and far, far away from here. Bethany was leaning against a stone pillar, out of breath from the amount of barriers she’d had to erect to keep them all safe.

“Hey Beth, we’ll be out of here in no time.” Ria took Bethany’s arm and put it over her shoulder, wrapping an arm around her sister’s waist. She was shivering. “I think Isabela might just enlist us to carry out all the jewels she’s finding.”

Varric found what they needed, and sure enough, the party was close to where they’d entered at the start of the expedition. He’d had to pull Isabela away from what she couldn’t carry, her colorful insults echoing off the chamber walls. Ria was glad for the widening tunnels, believing she could almost catch the smell of fresh air. That was when Bethany fell, straight from Ria’s grasp and on to the cut stone deep below the earth.

Her breathing was erratic, coming in choking gasps and dampened heaves for air. Eyes that were once so bright, had dimmed and clouded over in the darkness. They all knew what it was. The blight would keep Bethany here, claim her entirely in its corruption.

It was too much when she asked Ria to kill her, to put her out of her misery. Too much when she said to take care of their mother. Too much when Ria unsheathed her blade, about to do the one thing she’d never thought she’d have to. Ria’s free hand cradled Beth’s head, her dark hair still soft and familiar.

Isabela stood over the three of them, her face turned away with a hand covering the despair threatening to flow from her mouth. Varric knelt at Bethany’s side, his shoulders already bowed beneath the weight of her loss. “See ya real soon, Sunshine,” he choked out in a whisper. 

And Bethany’s eyes smiled sadly, as if to say, _“Not too soon, I hope.”_


End file.
